Avoiding the wave of foodborne illnesses
Stay alert to signs of spoilage, undercooking, urges UCI Health expert
IN THE NEWS: Jalapeno peppers, baby formula, eggs and lettuce have been linked to outbreaks of foodborne illnesses this summer, including Clostridium botulinum, E. coli and cyclospora.
Dr. Shruti Gohil, the assistant medical director of epidemiology and infection prevention at UCI Health, shared some tips with ABC 7 for avoiding gastrointestinal suffering amid so many items appearing on the “caution” list.
"I do think when you go out to eat, if anything looks unhealthy, it doesn't look like... meat (is) cooked fully or you see evidence of spoilage on any type of produce — those are all things to bring awareness to the manager or whoever it is that served you the food and say maybe this isn't the right thing to be eating today."
Experts also recommend ordering or cooking animal proteins well done, ensuring pasteurized eggs are used in sauces and dressings, and avoiding lukewarm food from buffets.
Gohil is an associate professor of infectious diseases at the UC Irvine School of Medicine. Her clinical interests include hospital epidemiology, infection prevention, communicable disease transmission and multidrug-resistant organism infections.
Her research is dedicated to evaluating the epidemiology of infections and designing pragmatic approaches for identifying high risk patients to prevent infections at the earliest opportunity. Her intent is to design innovative clinical decision tools in detecting and preventing multidrug-resistant organism and healthcare-associated infections across care settings.
Gohil led INSPIRE, a series of national studies to assess patient risk for multidrug-resistant bacterial infections and to prompt physicians to limit the use of extended-spectrum antibacterial drugs in real time. She is a member of The Infectious Diseases Society of America and the Society of Healthcare Epidemiologists in America.
About UCI Health
UCI Health is one of California’s largest academic health systems and the clinical enterprise of the University of California, Irvine. Established on July 1, 1976, UCI Health has grown into a 1,461-bed health system that includes UCI Health — Orange, UCI Health — Irvine, its newest facility, UCI Health — Irvine Rehabilitation Hospital, four Community Network hospitals and a growing network of ambulatory care centers across Orange and Los Angeles counties. As Orange County’s only academic health systems, UCI Health is home to the only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center based in the county, the region’s only American College of Surgeons-verified Level I adult and Level II pediatric trauma center, American College of Emergency Physicians Gold Level 1 Geriatric Emergency Department and a nationally recognized regional burn center verified by the American Burn Association. Powered by UC Irvine, UCI Health serves 5.6 million people across Orange County, western Riverside County and southeast Los Angeles County through excellence in patient care, research and medical education. Follow UCI Health on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and X.